ABN AMRO’s Impact Journey
Background
ABN AMRO is one of the largest banks in the Netherlands and it is one of the frontrunners in the financial sector on reporting on its value creation to society. ANB AMRO has reported on its value creation to society since 2018.
Additional information on the organization can be found here.
Value for ABN AMRO
The Impact Reports that ABN AMRO has been publishing since 2018 give a complete overview of both the positive and negative consequences of its business model, allowing the bank to make decisions based on impact. ABN AMRO is able to understand the trade-offs of its business and hence minimize, where possible, the negative effects of its activities. Additionally, the reports provide a way for ABN AMRO to transparently communicate its impact to clients and other stakeholders and contain detailed explanations of relevant impact-related concepts and definitions.
Four Impact Reports have been published to date: Impact Report 2018, Impact Report 2019 , Impact Report 2020 and Impact Report 2021.
How was impact measurement applied in practice?
The full societal impact of ABN AMRO’s activities was measured by conducting a company-wide Integrated Profit & Loss (IP&L). Following the impact measurement valuation approach, the following steps were followed: relevant stakeholders were identified; the scoping of the value chain and respective decisions were made to understand the upstream, own operations and downstream impact; then, all material impacts of ABN AMRO’s operations and portfolios were measured and monetised, ranging from CO2 emissions of clients to well-being of employees; lastly, impacts were attributed and aggregated based on ABN AMRO’s responsibility for, and influence over, the impact. Complimentarily, the fourth and latest version of the report (2021) included featured items to illustrate impact in three specific and key areas for the bank: mortgages and the housing market; biodiversity; and IT procurement and recycling.
For a detailed description of the steps followed, refer to the Impact Measurement in the Financial Sector document.
